Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 55.djvu/503

Rh on the left side of the box (looking from within), and kept closed by an ordiaryordinary [sic] thumb-latch placed fifteen inches from the floor. The remainder of the front of the box was closed in by wooden bars. The door was a wooden frame covered with screening. It was not arranged so as to open as soon as the latch was lifted, but required a force of four hundred grammes, even when applied to the best



advantage. The bar of the thumb-latch, moreover, would fall back into place again unless the door were pushed out at least a little. Eight cats (Nos. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, and 13) were, one at a time, left in this thumb-latch box. All exhibited the customary instinctive clawings and squeezings and bitings. Out of the eight, all succeeded, in the course of their vigorous struggles, in pressing down the thumb-piece, so that if the door had been free to swing open they could have escaped. Six succeeded in pushing both thumb-piece down and door out, so that the bar did not fall back into its place. Of these, five succeeded in also later pushing the door open, so that they escaped and got the fish outside. Of these, three, after about fifty trials, associated the complicated movements required with the sight of the interior of the box so firmly that they attacked the thumb-latch the moment they were put in."

In the cases of No. 1 and No. 6 the combination of accidents required was enough to make their successes somewhat rare.